While most Leftists are hanging streamers, putting the champagne on ice, and handing out the party hats in anticipation of watching Donald Trump marched in handcuffs into the Manhattan district attorney’s office, CNN host Van Jones is not quite ready to join the festivities. And the Party of Groupthink is as enraged as only conformists can get when they spy someone who is not just like them. Jones even had the temerity to suggest that Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg (D-Trump’s Head On a Platter) should step back, calm down, and think twice about indicting Trump on flimsy (at best) charges. Bragg is unlikely to listen, and Jones is getting a lot of flak for daring to think outside the establishment Leftist line.

Jones said sensibly on Monday, “If anybody is a Republican and they had been afraid there is some well-organized conspiracy among progressives, they can relax now, because you would not start with this charge.” Indeed, because as even the New York Times conceded on March 9, Bragg’s case is long on partisan hatred and notably bereft of substance. “Hush money is not inherently illegal,” the Times admitted, and then suggest a way that the case could be made stronger: “the prosecutors could argue that the $130,000 payout effectively became an improper donation to Mr. Trump’s campaign, under the theory that because the money silenced Ms. Daniels, it benefited his candidacy.” Well, all right, but that’s a stretch. Big corporations, as well as wealthy individuals, make nuisance payouts regularly, and no one is perp-walked for them.

And so Jones suggested forgetting this hush money case and going with other pending cases against Trump that he thinks are stronger: “You would start with the charge in Georgia where he was interfering with elections. You would start with the charge that he was helping the insurrectionists in a coup.” Has Jones forgotten that Trump was actually impeached for that last one, and that there has subsequently been a House committee devoted to it, and that neither one turned up anything that would stick?

Jones was right, however, about how weak Bragg’s case was. He added, “You wouldn’t start with an 8-year-old porn star payoff. This is proof, if nothing else, that the progressives are not very well organized. This is not the one you would start with.” He even said of Bragg that “the heat is on this DA. I think he’s going to make a very sober decision, and I would not be surprised if he doesn’t step back from the brink.” Maybe, but probably not at this point. Too many powerful Leftists are slavering for the photo-op of Trump in handcuffs. Bragg appears to think he is on the brink of national adulation. He isn’t going to step back.

Jones, however, was firm: “It doesn’t seem like the right way to go. History is not going to judge Donald Trump based on Stormy Daniels. It’s going to judge him based on the election, it’s going to judge him based on the coup attempt, the insurrection. I think if I were Alvin, I would wait for Georgia to go first. You have the president calling in, trying to change the election. That seems to me the thing to start with, not this.” But Bragg is so close, so very close, to being hailed and feted, bought drinks and more, by the cosseted intelligentsia who style themselves as plucky outsiders. It’s a big step up for someone whom no one had ever heard of just weeks ago.

Leftists jumped to rake Jones over the coals for daring to dissent. American Leftists have never been more censorious and intolerant of opposing views, and so Jones didn’t exactly pick a good time to show himself to be an independent thinker. Attorney and Fortune 500 speaker Exavier Pope tweeted: “Van Jones is not a serious person and should not be taken seriously. A sentient corn on the cob.”

Jack Hopkins, a Twitter user with 82,000 followers who says he is a former Republican, added:  “I just heard Van Jones on CNN shout out to Alvin Bragg and say ‘I’d back off and let Georgia go first’ and followed up by saying he wouldn’t be surprised to see Alvin Bragg back down. Be ashamed, Van. Be very ashamed.” Leftist “journalist” Molly Jong-Fast fumed: “Back on earth one this is **not how any of this works**.” Former Bernie Sanders surrogate Jonathan Tasini went for the sharp edge: “Evergreen reminder: Van Jones only cares about Van Jones.”

Maybe he does. But it’s noteworthy how contemporary Leftists treat disagreement. The rage at Jones only underscores how unlikely it is that Bragg will back away from the ledge. He doesn’t want to face the wrath of his fellow Leftists.